PSNI to quiz drivers in loyalist murder probe

Detectives investigating the loyalist paramilitary murder of a father-of-three will tomorrow set up vehicle checkpoints in the area where he was gunned down a week ago.

Delivery driver Michael Green, 42, was ambushed as he arrived to open up the furniture store where he worked.

He was shot at least five times by two Ulster Volunteer Force gunmen and is the fourth man to be killed since the organisation’s festering feud with the Loyalist Volunteer Force erupted last month.

Mr Green, from the Ballysillan district of north Belfast, was gunned down outside Gilpins Furniture Store on the loyalist Sandy Row in the south of the city.

He had just opened a side gate and got back on his motorcycle when the killers opened fire.

Police will this morning man checkpoints at Sandy Row and Abingdon Drive in a bid to secure a breakthrough in the inquiry.

A PSNI spokeswoman said: “Police will be stopping traffic and asking to speak to anyone who may have been in the area last Monday, August 15."

Northern Ireland Office Minister Lord Rooker described the murder as callous and cold-blooded.

As well as the murders, hundreds of UVF men also laid siege to a housing estate in the east of the city in a bid to drive out families associated with the LVF. Police and soldiers stood by during the occupation.

The other three shot dead since the hatred turned into bloodshed on July 1 were Stephen Paul, 28, and Craig McCausland, 20 – both in north Belfast – and Jameson Lockhart, 25, in the east of the city.